And why that’s a good thing.
New York Governor Kathy Hochul celebrates with State Assemblyman Micah Lasher, who won the NY-12 congressional primary, at an election-night party.
(John Lamparski / Bloomberg via Getty Images)
New York—Tuesday night belonged to Mayor Zohran Mamdani, whose three insurgent congressional candidates won their races, taking out two Democratic incumbents. But here on the Upper West Side, business went on as usual. And that’s not a bad thing.
Representative Jerry Nadler, the progressive 34-year veteran of the House of Representatives, got misty-eyed as he addressed a packed house at Jacob’s Pickles on Columbus Avenue. “It’s been the honor of my life to represent you,” he told the swooning crowd, as it chanted “Jerry, Jerry, Jerry.” Nadler spoke quickly; he knew he was just the opening act, there to introduce his mentee, Assembly member Micah Lasher, who pulled off an enormous win Tuesday night over an onslaught of AI money and two celebrity rivals.
In a race briefly defined by the candidacy of President John F. Kennedy’s wacky grandson Jack Schlossberg (who once led in some polls, but finished with just 11 percent of the vote), and the vanity run of anti-Trump former Republican George Conway (who earned just 6 percent), Lasher’s victory represented the endurance of the Upper West Side’s liberal/progressive political machine, defined by its local political clubs, from the Upper West Side Democrats (named most powerful by City and State magazine) and the Broadway Democrats to the Three Parks Independent Democrats; its large co-op and condo buildings and tidy housing projects that host political meetings in stuffy basement community rooms; an infinite number of only-in-New-York diners that host families in their mostly red-upholstered booths—and also, on any given day, serve most of the district’s popular elected officials.
This was Bella Abzug’s, Ted Weiss’s and Ed Koch’s congressional district. On Tuesday night, City Council member Gale Brewer, Assembly member Linda Rosenthal, New York Comptroller Mark Levine, and progressive former borough president and City Council member Ruth Messinger were all on hand to cheer their guy, Lasher, as he bested his only genuine rival in the end, the Upper East Side Assembly member Alex Bores.
Governor Kathy Hochul also showed up. Lasher once worked for her, she reminded the crowd. “Now, when Micah Lasher tells you he has an idea, it goes deep. I’m told he has 65 ideas for his Project 2027. I’m not sure why he’s slacking off—when he was my policy director, he literally walked in with 220 ideas. That’s a true story of a brand new governor.” The 44-year-old child magician turned political prodigy has worked for a stunning roster of state and local leaders, from Hochul to former Mayor Michael Bloomberg to, of course, Nadler. And they all love him—which Hochul showed by coming out Tuesday night, and Bloomberg by his huge PAC investment of $10 million, which helped Lasher fight off Bores, winning 39–35.
I’m aware I’m writing about what people might perceive as the least important congressional victory in my city. Yes, Mamdani’s three endorsees—Brad Lander, who challenged incumbent Representative Dan Goldman in NY-10; Darializa Avila Chevalier, who went up against incumbent Representative Adriano Espaillat in NY-13, and DSA’s Claire Valdez over establishment favorite (but genuine labor lefty and Working Families Party candidate) Antonio Reynoso—all won. Some late polls and early vote analysis had Avila Chevalier, Mamdani’s least experienced endorsee, who attended a controversial October 8 rally where some speakers praised Hamas and endorsed a specious and creepy rape claim against Joe Biden made by Tara Reade and other fringe lefties, among other incendiary social-media comments she later disavowed, falling behind. Those analyses were wrong.
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But as respected progressive Substacker Michael Lange wrote on Monday, “If [Mamdani’s endorsements] are a war to define the future of The Left, NY-12 is a test of the endurance of local institutions in a political arena that has become increasingly nationalized.” Local institutions won, and I’m happy about that.
The cherubic Lasher eventually got to the mic in the overflow room at Jacob’s Pickles. “When I began this race, I said there were two things above all that I wanted to do in Congress,” he told the crowd. “Revamp and recharge a Democratic party in Washington that has in so many ways failed to meet the moment, and help transform it into the opposition party it must be, so we can take on the madman in the White House,” Lasher said to cheers.
He also laid into the roster of AI (also crypto firms) who poured millions into the race (to be fair, some of the spending was against Bores). “I have some news for the two big AI companies who’ve taken such an unusual interest in who won this congressional seat,” he said. “I won’t be taking my cues from either of you when it comes to protecting our kids, our jobs and our environment.”
And he devoted a big chunk of his speech to Nadler. “I want to speak about the man who I am so proud to succeed, but whose shoes I will never be able to fully fill,” he said. “New York City’s liberal lion, the man who was progressive before it was popular…. So many times, it was his work that made the impossible appear inevitable. For gay rights, for trans rights, for abortion access. Against bad trade.… Jerry has been here our entire lives, governing with courage and without fear, delivering change that echoes across the nation. I cannot replace him. But in all I do, I will seek to emulate him.” There were a few people misty-eyed besides Nadler.
Rather bizarrely, Politico declared the NY-12 outcome as “Big Tech won the race.” But Lasher was never the candidate of Big Tech; Bores was the beneficiary, and sometimes the victim, of a vicious proxy war between warring AI giants, with the Anthropic side, which mostly backed Bores, perceived as the good guys, because they do support slightly stronger government regulation than their foes at Open AI (but far less than is needed). This was a story of the race that the media told itself, from The New York Times to the tabloids to Politico, as the media so often does. Let’s hope it fades the way most political coverage does, being so peripheral and ephemeral. Because that’s not what happened here.
As Michael Lange reported first, NY-12 was a story of organizing. The “early vote produced 38,340 ballots—the most of any district, and 60% of its entire 2025 early vote,” he wrote. The three districts with Mamdani-supported candidates struggled with the early vote, but obviously closed the gap by election day. The NY-12 early voter was “old,” in Lange’s words; almost half were over 65 (Yay, us!). This is a high-propensity voting base, the second-most-affluent, second-most-Jewish, and among the most educated in the country. That helped Lasher, who it seems has known most of the Upper West Side electorate since he was a child. At least in the early vote, the Upper West Side outvoted the Upper East Side, giving Lasher an advantage Bores almost could not overcome on Election Day.
But Lange had one piece of good news for Bores on Monday: “Bores will win both Oligarch Alley, the district’s wealthiest corridor from Park to Fifth Avenue, and the East Side’s younger professional pockets, most notably Yorkville.”
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And across town Tuesday night, Jack Schlossberg borrowed from his grandfather for his words of wisdom: “All of us ask not what our country can do, but what we can do to help our city.” Let’s hope Schlossberg starts by getting a good job in our city, rather than thinking he can launch his career by being a Congress member.
Meanwhile, I hope Mayor Mamdani is ultimately able to replicate something like the Upper West Side progressive political machine elsewhere in the city. It encourages buy-in from longtime residents, and ropes in newcomers (like me). Between them, DSA and WFP have formidable organizing arms, but they have excelled at turning out the newest residents of lefty, gentrifying districts. I’d love to see a few progressive congressional districts develop a political infrastructure like NY-12. We have the kind of “relational organizing” national groups are trying to get off the ground, at least 60 years in the making.
With the midterm elections now firmly upon us, the question is whether Democratic candidates will do more than merely occupy ballot lines as mild alternatives to the red-hot crisis that is Donald Trump.
As Trump spends over $1 billion a day on a globally destabilizing war on Iran and admits that he doesn’t “think about Americans’ financial situation,” millions across the country are struggling with the surging costs of essentials. Democrats must seize this moment and advance bold, small-“d” populist ideas—not settle for cynical caution that once again snatches defeat from the jaws of victory.
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Onward,
Katrina vanden Heuvel
Editor and Publisher, The Nation
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